Broken Pinky Toes

I broke my pinky toe on a coffee table a few years back. I had gotten up off the couch to walk into the kitchen, misjudged the distance between my bare foot and the solid oak corner of the table, and foot met table with a loud thud. You could almost hear the crunch of the bone.

I didn't scream (out loud -- there was some internal screaming), and the tears didn't come (there was also some internal sobbing), but I plopped right back down on the couch and held my poor foot and rocked for a while in silent agony. 

Looking back on it now that I'm some distance from the occurrence, the physical reaction of my entire body was interesting. Goose bumps raised on my arms in sheer reaction to the pain that shot through me. I was unable to speak, because my jaw was so tightly clamped in a wild effort for control. The whole room got spectacularly clear for a few seconds as stars danced in the corners of my vision and all the light seemed to pinpoint in the center of what I was looking at -- which were the coasters on the coffee table, for what it's worth. 

It was like this for a few seconds... and then my vision went back to normal, my goose bumps disappeared. The pain was still there, but the immediate reaction to the impact was gone. I limped into the kitchen and had to undergo the barrage of questions from my family: What happened?

I remember someone (maybe it was me, I'm not sure) saying: "Well, at least it was the pinky toe." And we all agreed, that was fortunate. It wasn't like I had broken my arm or my leg. That really would have been a hassle.

Turns out, you can't do much for broken toes. I did end up taping it to the toe next to it to try to stabilize it just a bit, and I iced it pretty regularly to try to keep the swelling down, but that was the extent of my treatment. The toe turned nearly black for quite a while, and I limped on it for a solid month. 

But what was really interesting was this: I had no idea how much I depended on my pinky toe for balance. I could soon put weight on the foot again, but not equally distributed weight because of how tender the toe was, so when I would try to roll my foot just a bit to keep my pinky toe free of weight... all of me would tilt off balance.

The silly little protrusion on the outside edge of my foot... was super important for maintaining my walk.

"You can talk the talk, but can you walk the walk?" If you have a broken pinky toe, maintaining your walk gets a lot harder.

Paul spends a lot of time using the body as a metaphor for the church (See: The Problem With Potlucks). Here in 1 Corinthians 12:12-31, he dives into this metaphor with depth, and he divides the discussion into two perspectives.

Perspective #1: He talks about the "parts of the body" from the perspective of those who feel less important among the fellowship of believers, among the church. "Now the body is not made up of one part but of many. If the foot should say, 'Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body,' it would not for that reason cease to be part of the body. And if the ear should say, 'Because I am not an eye, I do not belong to the body,' it would not for that reason cease to be part of the body. If the whole body were an eye, where would the sense of hearing be? If the whole body were an ear, where would the sense of smell be? But in fact, God has arranged the parts in the body, every one of them, just as He wanted them to be. If they were all one part, where would the body be? As it is, there are many parts, but one body" (1 Corinthians 12:14-20).

For some reason, this makes me think of The Little Drummer Boy: 

Little baby, pa rum pum pum pum
I am a poor boy, too, pa rum pum pum pum
I have no gift to bring, pa rum pum pum pum
That's fit to give our King, pa rum pum pum pum...

I joke about that song: Aww, yeah, just what Mary ordered, a kid who beats his drum set just when she's trying to get the baby to sleep.

But the beautiful thought behind this song is: The "poor boy, too" -- who has "no gift to bring" -- presents himself at the manger in Bethlehem, and he is bringing a beautiful gift: He offers himself at the manger. The song has no biblical basis (there's no drummer boy who shows up at the manger in Luke 2 or Matthew 2), but the attitude in the lyrics reflects the attitude of Isaiah when the Lord asks: "Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?" And Isaiah steps forward with nothing but his willingness and says: "Here I am; send me" (Isaiah 6:8).

The pinky toe balances the foot, and through the foot, carries the rest of the body, keeping it from stumbling.

In Perspective #2 in the Corinthians passage, Paul addresses those who feel more important, and who may... look down on the lesser parts of the fellowship of believers. "The eye cannot say to the hand, 'I don't need you!' And the head cannot say to the feet, 'I don't need you!' On the contrary, those parts of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensable, and the parts that we think are less honorable we treat with special honor. And the parts that are unpresentable are treated with special modesty, while our presentable parts need no special treatment. But God has combined the members of the body and has given greater honor to the parts that lacked it, so that there should be no division in the body, but that its parts should have equal concern for each other. If one part suffers, every part suffers with it; if one part is honored, every part rejoices with it" (1 Corinthians 12:21-26).

Once upon a time, a prophet visited the city of Bethlehem where he had been commissioned by God to anoint the next king of Israel. When he reached Bethlehem, he saw a tall and strong-looking young man who seemed to be a natural leader, and he thinks: "Surely the Lord's anointed stands here before the Lord." 

But the Lord replied, "Nope." ...That my translation. The NIV, which is perhaps a more accurate translation, goes as follows: "Do not consider his appearance or his height, for I have rejected him. The Lord does not look at the things man looks at. Man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart."

So the prophet ended up anointing the youngest, the least of these, the sheep-herder who wasn't even important enough to be called in from the fields for the great prophet's visit (does this remind you of Cinderella, who isn't considered important enough to attend the royal ball, but who ends up as the chosen wife of the prince? A little bit, maybe).

Anyway, the Corinthian church seemed to be placing a great deal of emphasis on "the important gifts" of the Holy Spirit. Paul just got done enumerating some of those gifts in 1 Corinthians 12:8-10, but now he needs to address the elephant in the room. "Some of y'all are giving greater honor to the 'juicy gifts,' the 'fun gifts,' and the 'wow-factor gifts.'" (That's my translation again, in case you were wondering.) 

He entrenches himself in his point in 12:27: "Now you are the body of Christ, and each one of you is a part of it." In other words, while the pinky toe might not carry the essential life-giving responsibility of the heart to pump blood to all parts of the body... if it is missing in action, broken, or fractured, it affects your walk. The entire body limps without its stabilizing influence.

"You can talk the talk, but can you walk the walk?" Can you walk without limping?

And in that, we find our relevance. Got the gift of prophecy? Awesome. Use it for the glory of God and to edify the church. Got the gift of behind the scenes administration (my husband's spiritual gift)? Use it for the glory of God and to edify the church. All parts work together, and the "weaker parts," or rather, those parts that seem to be weaker... are actually indispensable.

Here's where the confusion comes: We look at the heart and think it's more important than the pinky toe because of what it does. However, that's irrelevant. The point is: the heart has a role to play and the pinky toe has a role to play, and if the pinky toe doesn't play its role, it affects the whole body, just as much as the heart would affect the body if it didn't play its role.  

There's a different script for each actor, but each script is still a part of the whole play. 

I'll repeat a line from yesterday's blog, because I think it's important: "The Holy Spirit gives us gifts for the praise of His glory -- all gifts working together for the common good, so that the church can be in relationship with the Father."

And in the next chapter, Paul ties it all together in a really excellent way, but I'll save it for then. :)